My husband, Fred, and I were visiting my mother the other night and something a bit on the "rowdy side" was brought up in conversation. Fred made the comment that he bet "Grannie" as he calls my grandmother, "Never would have made such comments or done anything outlandish." This brought a snort of disbelief from my mother who said, with a grin, "Wanna bet? Ask her about "running moonshine or bootleg whiskey with her first husband." Grannie a "bootlegger" ?????? Surely not, but I remember her telling me such tales before ......
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Fred brought up the question later that afternoon, while he, Nana and myself sat on the large screened front porch enjoying the cool breezes..
"Grannie, Mom said you used to be a bootlegger, is that true??"
With a chuckle and a gleam in her eye she said, "Well, actually, I just ran the bootleg whiskey around and delivered it with my first husband, Frank. It was Frank's uncle who was actually the "bootlegger", he had a huge still set up out behind the barn. It was there he made the whiskey. He was a milkman, sold fresh milk to people around town. That was how Frank and I delivered it. We delivered milk to our customers every morning. They would leave money in the empty milk bottles with a note saying " 2 quarts and..", that was our way of knowing they wanted two quarts of milk and one quart of moonshine whiskey." We left the moonshine right there on the step along with the morning's milk. Frank and his uncle painted milk bottles white , filled them with the whiskey and even put the little cardboard milk caps we used at the time on them. You couldn't tell by looking, which held milk, or whiskey."
Astonished, Fred asked, "Did you ever get caught?"
Laughing a bit and having to pause to catch her breath after a coughing episode, Nana replied, "Oh, No...never got caught. Came close a few times, but they never could catch us with the whiskey so they couldn't prove a thing!"
" I remember one time the police did stop us during a milk delivery, guess someone said something, or they were just suspicious, they asked what we were carrying. Without batting an eye, Frank said, just milk....we're just delivering milk today. (Laugh) It was actually the truth, THAT morning all we had on the truck was milk!" "Another time, Frank backed the milk truck into someone's fence, he even paid the lady for the damage, but she called the police anyhow. The police showed up knocking at our door and we just knew we'd been caught. Was a big relief , I tell you when the officer simply asked about the fence and if there was any injuries of anyone in the truck.!" "Then again, there was the time we nearly got caught delivering a LOT of whiskey to a boat. I don't know who bought it, or where they were taking it. Just as Frank and I handed the last gallon jug to the men in the boat, we heard sirens and saw a police car coming our way. The boat sped off and Frank and I got in the car and took off too. Of course, they couldn't chase the boat, but they chased us a while and finally we pulled over. They made us open the trunk. There was nothing in there though of course by that time, so they had to just let us go." Yup, Frank and I delivered bootleg whiskey for three years or so, I'd guess."
Shaking his head in surprise, Fred , said, "a Bootlegging Grannie, I never would have though YOU would have ever done something so wild! How old were you and Frank?"
"Oh, probably 15, 16, 17 years old at the time. We married young. Those were some days, I tell you, some days....."
